Executive Summary

This report is the endline report for a two-time-point study of commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) in Napak District of the Karamoja Region in Uganda. The objectives of this study are two-fold. The first objective is to evaluate the effectiveness of the Community Action to End Child Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation project, known as Community Action project, funded by the Global Fund to End Modern Slavery through a grant from the U.S. Department of State Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, in changing the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of Napak residents regarding CSEC and child trafficking. To enable the evaluation of the effectiveness of this project, our sample included both intervention and control areas in Napak. Baseline data collection took place in February and March 2021 before the start of the intervention. Endline data collection took place in July and August 2022 near the end of the intervention. This report compares knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to CSEC from before and after the intervention in control and intervention areas to shed light on the effectiveness of the intervention. The second objective is to create a population-based measure of CSEC in Napak. Like the baseline report from June 2021, this endline report provides an estimate of the prevalence of CSEC in Napak District.

Community Action project was implemented by Terre des Hommes and Dwelling Places in Napak District of Karamoja from 2021 to 2022. It targeted both prevention and response to CSEC, with the aim of protecting 2,000 at-risk children in Napak District from CSEC. The project sought to reduce vulnerability to CSEC and raise awareness among community members to identify and report suspected cases of CSEC. The project activities evaluated in this study included establishing child right clubs and supporting CSEC victims to return to and remain in school, increasing knowledge among Napak residents of child trafficking laws and policies and responsible parties, and strengthening positive parenting practices.

Background

Napak District of Karamoja is a rural region in northeast Uganda. In Karamoja, child trafficking is a significant concern because most internal trafficking child victims in Uganda are ethnically Karamojong. Karamoja’s extremely high rate of multidimensional child poverty (84 percent), which refers to a lack of both material and social needs,1 and a traditional acceptance of migration for livelihood increase children’s vulnerability to CSEC. The prevalence of CSEC and a thorough identification of vulnerabilities and risk factors have not been fully studied in Uganda. No prior studies offer an estimate of the prevalence of CSEC in the Karamoja Region.

Methods

The study is designed to provide estimates representative of all adults and all children ages 12 to 17 in Napak District. The sample includes both the intervention area in which Community Action project was expected to be implemented and control areas in Napak. The final baseline sample included 986 households (adults) and 830 children ages 12 to 17. For the endline, we returned to the same households as much as possible. The final endline sample size was 888 household-level (adult) interviews and 414 child interviews. There were no statistically significant differences between the demographic characteristics of adults or children at the two time points.

The design called for a comparison of the change over time for respondents in the intervention sub-counties and control sub-counties. However, we found that respondents living in intervention and control sub-counties participated in the intervention in approximately equal proportions. We reassigned participants to treatment and control groups, called “exposed” and “unexposed,” based on their exposure to the project. We use a difference-in-differences (DID) approach with the exposed and unexposed groups to evaluate the effect of the intervention.

Findings

Exposure to and engagement with Community Action project: Nearly 40 percent of adults attended at least one of Community Action’s in-person offerings (the “exposed” group), including theater plays, parent trainings, and community dialogues. Men had greater levels of attendance and active engagement compared to women. One-fifth of children participated in a child rights club activity (the “exposed” group), and the participation was similar for boys and girls.

Changes in knowledge: The DID analysis indicates that the intervention had a positive effect on adult knowledge of child trafficking risk factors, but this effect is not statistically significant. The project had a positive effect of the adult knowledge of the Trafficking in Persons Act of 2009 (statistically significant), the Napak District Child Protection Ordinance (not statistically significant), and the term “child trafficking” (not statistically significant).

Changes in attitude: There was a slight increase in the age at which adults felt that people should seek and perform income-generating activities to provide for their families and the age at which it is good to go and look for food and money in another town, and the increase was greater for adults in the exposed group than the unexposed group, but the effect was not statistically significant. There was an increase in both groups in the proportion of adults who listed both mothers and fathers when asked who should make the decision about whether a child migrates for work, but the difference between the groups was not statistically significant.

The percentage of people agreeing with this statement, “CSEC survivors should be treated the same as everyone else” decreased between baseline and endline for both the unexposed and exposed groups, and the decrease was greater for respondents in the exposed group (although not statistically significant). Respondents may have disagreed with the statement because they feel that CSEC survivors need additional support rather than being treated the same as everyone else.

The awareness of the risk of trafficking in the respondent’s community decreased among unexposed respondents and increased among respondents in the exposed group, but this difference is not statistically significant. The percentage of children who believe that migrating is the only way to make enough money to survive decreased for both the unexposed and exposed groups between baseline and endline, with a slightly greater decrease for the exposed group, and the difference was not statistically significant.

Changes in practice: Improved parenting practices. The project had a positive effect on practices regarding caregivers knowing their children’s whereabouts and children’s friends (although the results do not rise to the level of statistical significance), but the project had no effect on adult perceptions of children’s truthfulness.

The proportion of children who stated that their caregivers always know where they are decreased for children in the unexposed group and increased for the children in the exposed group. The difference is statistically significant, suggesting that the project has a positive impact on parent-child communication. The proportion of children who report that their caregivers know their friends very well decreased for children in the unexposed group and increased for children in the exposed group, and the difference was not statistically significant.

The proportion of children who report never keeping secrets from their caregivers decreased for children in the unexposed group and increased for children in the exposed group. This difference is statistically significant, and this is another indicator that the project had a positive impact on parent-child communication. The proportion of children who report talking to their caregivers about important things a lot increased in both unexposed and exposed groups. The increase was greater in the exposed group, but the difference was not statistically significant.

Self-evaluations also indicated that the project had an effect on parenting practices. The majority (82 percent) of those who listened to or participated in Community Action project activities made changes to their parenting practices, and the rate was slightly higher for men (86 percent) than women (79 percent). The most common change was more open communication with children, reported by 73 percent of those who made a change.

Greater interest in the topic of child trafficking. Adults in the exposed group were significantly more likely to state that they talk about child trafficking more than one year ago (77 percent for the exposed group, compared to 57 percent for the unexposed group). Children in the exposed group were also significantly more likely to state that they talk about child trafficking more than one year ago (90 percent for the exposed group, compared to 60 percent for the unexposed group).

Prevalence of CSEC: At endline, a total of 6 percent of children had ever experienced CSEC, 3 percent experienced CSEC in the last year, and 2 percent experienced CSEC in the past month. The sample size of children who had experienced CSEC is too small for reliable analysis by gender or age. All of the endline estimates are lower than baseline estimates, but the endline results are not directly comparable to the baseline results because of the change in mode of administration, from entirely self-administered to interviewer-administered for half of the children. The DID results indicate that the prevalence of CSEC decreased both for children in the exposed and unexposed groups, but the decrease was greater for children in the exposed group (not statistically significant).

Conclusions and recommendations

For nearly every indicator, participants in the project demonstrated the results that the project hoped to achieve. For three indicators, the DID between participants and non-participants was statistically significant. For the remaining indicators, there was no statistical significance. However, the lack of statistical significance may reflect insufficient power to detect the effect rather than a lack of effect. Taken as a whole, the results suggest that Community Action project was successful in its efforts to raise awareness around child trafficking and improve parent-child relationships.

Future programming of this kind could explore how to increase the participation and active engagement of women. Future research should explore whether similar programming conducted over a longer period of time with a longer period between waves of data collection results in a sustained change in the prevalence of CSEC.

There is a continued need for a variety of interventions in Napak communities. Despite improvements over the past year, there is still a need for interventions to prevent CSEC in Napak District. Future programming could explore CSEC that is taking place within Napak communities as well as CSEC that results from child trafficking away from Karamoja. There is also a continued need to support the integration of CSEC survivors.

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